


A Kind of Glow

by inlovewithnight



Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Didn't Know They Were Dating, Multi, Poly V, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-06
Updated: 2014-01-06
Packaged: 2018-01-07 16:14:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1121909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another affair goes all awry and Mrs. Hudson comes and takes up residence with Joan and Sherlock. What happens next?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Kind of Glow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Amadi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amadi/gifts).



Ms. Hudson returns to the brownstone in a swirl of suitcases and shopping bags, with a slightly brittle smile on her face and only a slight glitter of tears in her eyes.

Joan goes to the kitchen to make tea, not knowing what else to do, and returns to the study to find Sherlock whisking Ms. Hudson up the stairs, his arms around her with comfort and familiarity.

Joan drinks all three cups of tea herself, and sits up all night playing Solitaire on her laptop while Clyde trundles over her bedding like mountains. She leaves the door ajar so she can listen down the hall, trying to decode the rise and fall of murmuring voices from the guest bedroom. Ms. Hudson’s room.

She can’t make out a thing, though, and by the time exhaustion kicks in with the first hint of dawn, she’s almost convinced herself she doesn’t care.

**

It only takes a day for her to remember that it’s nice having Ms. Hudson staying with them; she adds a calm, light energy to the house, noticeable without being intrusive. It’s probably part of whatever she offers to her patrons as their muse, or perhaps the entirety of it: she brings a pleasant note to life. It’s lovely to have her around.

She walks with Joan to the dry cleaner’s one morning, both of them loaded down with clothes that have suffered through the indignities of investigations (Joan’s, Sherlock’s) or daily wear while being too delicate for the Laundromat (Ms. Hudson’s).

A truck is backed up half-onto the sidewalk, and they both have to rise on their toes and twist sideways to squeeze past it.

“Does it bother you at all,” Joan asks lightly, “how you have to come down in the world when you come stay with us?”

Ms. Hudson glances back over her shoulder, eyes wide with surprise. “Of course not! I don’t think of it that way at all!”

“I just mean that I’m sure you never have to take your own dry cleaning in at any of the other places you stay.”

Ms. Hudson pauses for a moment and tilts her head, considering that while Joan comes up beside her again. “No,” she says finally, “but the quality of the conversation is so much greater. It more than makes up for it.”

Joan laughs. “I’m flattered.”

“You and Sherlock are wonderful to live with.” She puts her hand on Joan’s arm until Joan looks at her. “There’s such an energy around you two. I swear, you make everything glow.”

Joan doesn’t know what to say, can’t possibly think of anything to say, and after a moment, Ms. Hudson smiles faintly, squeezes her arm, and steps away. They run the rest of their errands in silence thoughtful (on Joan’s part) and knowing (on Ms. Hudson’s).

**

A week or so later, Joan goes to bed late again, this time because of the distractions of all-night happy-hour prices and her friends insisting that she either come out with them willingly or be dragged physically from the house. Sherlock indicated that he would gladly prevent anyone from laying a hand on her person with intent to drag, but Ms. Hudson told her that she should go, she should have a nice time, there would more than likely be no cases for them, and anyway, she would keep Sherlock occupied with reminiscences of England.

Joan preferred to avoid reminiscences of England if at all possible. Sherlock usually tended toward bitter, not maudlin, but “usually” was not “always,” and she dreaded the appearance of maudlin Sherlock the way she dreaded few other things.

She tries to pick her way carefully through the brownstone and up the stairs, but before she reaches the landing she realizes there’s no need; Sherlock and Ms. Hudson are not asleep. Very much not asleep.

Very much awake, and very much together, in Sherlock’s room.

Joan hesitates in the hallway, looking toward the bedroom. Sherlock’s door is only open about a double handspan, but it’s enough: she can see Sherlock’s back, curved over Ms. Hudson’s body, two stretches of warm bare skin. 

_They’re beautiful_ , she thinks, in the part of her brain not blank with surprise.

She comes back to herself and hurries the last few steps to her own room, closing the door tightly behind her and throwing herself face-down on the bed. The drinks from earlier are making her whole body spin.

She can still hear them, and she can’t fall asleep.

**

She successfully avoids Sherlock the next morning, and most of the rest of the day, until he simply plants himself outside the bathroom and is standing there staring at her when she opens the door.

“Go away,” she says, pointing down the hall toward his room. “Shoo.”

“We need to talk, Watson.”

“We do not.”

“We do.” He nods decisively. “Please come downstairs and we’ll talk over tea.”

“I’d really rather--”

“Watson.” Sherlock stands up straighter, thrusting his chin out with the gesture that he intends to be stern assurance but that always comes across more as stubbornness and preparing to be difficult. “We must talk. It’s a matter of great importance.”

She rolls her eyes. “Is it a case?”

“No.”

“Then what’s important about it?”

He huffs sharply and bounces on his toes, the heels of his shoes tapping against the floor. “A matter of _personal_ importance!”

“Oh. Well, in that case.” Joan sighs and tucks her hair back behind her ears. “Lead the way.”

Once she’s seated at the table, Sherlock bustles around the kitchen with the speed of anxiety. Joan watches him thoughtfully; it’s rare for Sherlock to admit to wanting to discuss personal matters, rarer for him to ask for a specific sit-down instead of bursting out with the personal matters at an inappropriate time, and not at all rare for him to work himself into a state of nervousness that makes it impossible for him to hold still. 

She accepts the tea from him and nods at the chair across from her. “Talk to me.”

He sits and taps his fingers restlessly on the table, frowning down at his tea. “As I said, it’s a personal matter.”

“Understood.”

He clears his throat and looks up to the ceiling, his hands still flickering along the table like spiders. “It’s about Ms. Hudson.”

Joan chokes on her tea. “Sherlock. That’s none of my--”

“I’d like the two of you to be friends.”

Joan forces herself to take another sip of tea, swallow this one carefully, and then set the mug down. “Pardon?”

“Friends, Joan. Currently you are, at best, friendly acquaintances, and it concerns me.”

“Concerns you?” Joan curls her fingers against her palms to keep from reaching across the table and physically stopping his hands. “How so?”

He shrugs, a sharp and jerky movement that involves his whole torso. “You’re both intelligent, capable, rather… captivating women. And you’re living in the same home, at the moment. It seems wrong that you shouldn’t be friends.”

There’s something almost charming about his inability to admit to centering himself between the two of them, to wanting them to be friendly for his own comfort. “We’re perfectly friendly, Sherlock.”

“Friendly acquaintances, as I said. I don’t see a reason why you shouldn’t be more.”

Joan blinks. “More.”

“Don’t force me to get my thesaurus, Watson. Synonyms for friendship will get tiresome in a hurry.”

She settles back in her seat and takes another sip of tea. “How do you propose I go about forcing friendship on her, exactly?”

“Force? Hardly.” He huffs a sharp breath and drums his hands on the table again. “Establishing a friendship is your strength more than mine, by far. Do all of the things you insist on attempting to do with me, I suppose. Take her to the opera. Invite her to watch your baseball games. Take her for coffee or to that dreadful happy hour you go to with your other friends. I can’t imagine anything more horrid, but maybe she would find it enjoyable.”

Joan thinks for a moment. “You’re serious.”

“Am I ever less than serious, Watson?” He glares down his nose at her. “You are, of course, entirely entitled to do as you wish. It’s merely a suggestion.”

“It’s a request.”

“Fine. A request.”

She gets to her feet, cupping her hands around her mug. “Since you asked so nicely, Sherlock, of course. I’ll court Ms. Hudson’s friendship.”

His eye widen in surprise, but he claps his hands together with aplomb. “Splendid! I’m so pleased, Watson.”

“One question?”

“Of course.”

“What is her first name?”

Sherlock blinked rapidly. “Oh, I couldn’t possibly. That’s hers to tell you, not mine.”

“Sherlock--”

“I’m glad we had this talk, Watson.” Sherlock gets to his feet and hurries from the room, leaving his tea behind on the table. Joan shakes her head and turns to the stairs. He’s too damn fast sometimes. Like a spider all over.

**

Ms. Hudson loves the opera. She loves venti caramel mochas with a triple shot. She likes going through long walks through the actual city; the park makes her anxious. She doesn’t like watching baseball, but she likes watching Joan watch baseball. And she understands that art isn’t Joan’s thing so much as it is Sherlock’s, she understands completely, but if Joan would just accompany her to the exhibition, that would be lovely, she can bring her phone, of course, she doesn’t even have to--

Joan leaves her phone in her purse, and listens closely as they walk around and Ms. Hudson tells her about the paintings and what she sees in them, what they mean.

They stop in the gift shop on the way out of the museum. Joan buys a few postcard prints to pin up on the wall of her room. Ms. Hudson buys the official book detailing the exhibition. They smile at each other from the adjacent cash registers.

“It’s later than I thought,” Ms. Hudson says. “Shall we get dinner on the way back? There’s a wonderful Italian place near here.”

“Is Italian your favorite?” Joan asks, the question springing up from somewhere surprising and nearly-unknown inside her, a quiet dimly-lit little place.

Ms. Hudson laughs, blinking and brushing her hair from her forehead. “I suppose it is. I don’t really think of it that way, in general; I have so many favorites. But as a category, yes, I’d say it is.”

“Then lead the way.”

They tromp down the sidewalk, gift bags over their wrists, heels clicking with their strides. “What’s your favorite?” Ms. Hudson asks her. “We’ll get that next time.”

“Oh, wow.” Joan thinks for a minute. “My mom would be angry with me for not saying Chinese--authentic Chinese, I mean, the good stuff--but really I love Ethiopian. There’s this little place some of the cops pointed out to me, it’s amazing.”

Ms. Hudson smiles and loops her elbow with Joan’s. “Next time, you’ll have to take me there.”

**

They get home giggling about their waiter and tipsy on red wine, leaning on each other as they make their way through the entry back toward the kitchen. “Coffee,” Ms. Hudson declares. “Coffee will set us both straight.”

Sherlock is standing in the middle of the study, watching them with the expression Joan knows well by now, the one that means he’s afflicted by levels of emotion that he hasn’t yet categorized and pinned down like butterfly wings, and it’s distressing him greatly. 

“Sherlock,” she says, letting go of Ms. Hudson’s arm. “Would you like some coffee, too?”

“I’m quite fine, thank you.” He watches Ms. Hudson vanish into the kitchen, then looks at Joan again. “Perhaps we could talk in the morning, though? You and I?”

“Of course,” Joan says, frowning at him. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, quite.”

“Is there a new case?”

“No, no, it’s been very quiet.”

“Well, tell me what you need to talk about, we’ll take care of it now, just--”

“Watson.” Sherlock shakes his head and fixes her with a stern look. “The morning will be fine. Go have your coffee and… and womanly conversation. I’m sure that will be lovely. Charming. Excellent.” He pauses, his eyes darting left and right. “I’ll be upstairs.”

She watches him hurry up the stairs and shakes her head. “He is exhausting sometimes,” she says aloud, to the room, and Clyde, and Ms. Hudson if she can hear her.

No response comes from the kitchen, though (or from Clyde for that matter), and after a moment she takes a breath and goes to see if she can help with the coffee.

**

Sherlock’s idea of a charming, lovely, excellent morning chat is to show up at the foot of Joan’s bed five minutes after her alarm goes off.

“When you look at me like that,” she says evenly, “you look like a sad catfish. Possibly even a clinically depressed catfish.”

He glares at her. She stares back.

“You should have that looked into,” she says finally. “I’m not sure if you need a psychiatrist or a veterinarian.”

“Watson--”

“Do veterinarians even look at fish? I guess probably not. What can you do for a fish, medically speaking?”

“I’m sure you would know more than I do.” He huffs in irritation. “Can we speak now?”

“We are speaking. And you’re giving me catfish face.”

“Watson!”

She sighs and sits up, pulling her hair back into a loose twist. “Talk.”

“It has occurred to me, recently, over the past two weeks--” He stops, frowning slightly, and begins again. “I know that I told you it would be a good idea to--but perhaps I misunderstood, on some level, and I certainly didn’t intend to make things awkward. I hope you know that, in this case, it was not _deliberate_ on my part, but only one of those moments where I… I misunderstand common human interaction, or perhaps--”

“Sherlock.” She held up her hand to stop him. “You’re not making any sense.”

“I intended for the two of you to be friends.”

“Me and Ms. Hudson?”

He glares at her again. “Yes, of course, what else would we be talking about?”

“I have absolutely no idea.”

“Then keep up, Watson, please, and don’t derail me from my train of thought.”

She wants to keep quiet, she really does, she should let him have his moment, but--“Don’t you mean derail your train of thought? Not derail you from it? Trains get derailed, not passengers.”

He visibly deflates. “You’re mocking me. My lack of understanding is humor to you.”

“No, your mixed metaphor is humor to me.” She follows the dodging of his gaze left and right until he looks at her. “Sherlock. Finish what you were saying.”

It takes him a moment and several deep breaths before he speaks. “It was my intention that the two of you become friends. Not that you should… date her.”

Joan blinks. “What?”

“Not that I believe you were doing so intentionally either, of course, I know that you are not possessed of Sapphic desires, Watson, but I believe that Ms. Hudson may have inadvertently been given the impression--”

“Wait. _Wait_.” Joan put both hands up this time. “First of all, what? Second of all… never say ‘possessed of Sapphic desires.’ Ever again. Third of all… what are you _talking_ about?”

“Ms. Hudson believes you are _courting_ her!”

“How can that possibly be the case, when I know for a fact that you and she are… are…” She casts around for a word and finds that she cannot possibly say ‘fucking’ or ‘screwing’ or anything equivalent when she’s picturing Sherlock and Ms. Hudson. None of those words fit at all for what she’s seen and heard from down the hall. “Involved!”

His mouth drops open. “How do you know about that?”

She punches the mattress. “The walls are thin, Sherlock, come on. You’re supposed to be a genius.”

He draws himself stiffly upright. “And you’re supposed to be a heterosexual woman, not one who comes home with her companion’s lipstick smeared on her scarf!”

“ _What_?”

“It’s very basic observation, Watson, you wear drugstore brands and Ms. Hudson prefers high-end department store collections and your scarf, the blue silk, the other night after you and she went on another _walk_ \--”

“Oh my god, Sherlock.”

“I only am concerned that perhaps you are leading her on, unintentionally of course, because as a heterosexual woman you may not be _aware_ of the impression you’re giving!”

“When did I _ever_ tell you that I’m heterosexual?”

He blinks, once, then several more times. “Well.”

“Think really carefully.”

“It was an observation.”

“Negative space, Sherlock. The absence of… of…” She puts her head down between her knees. “I’m too angry to think of the right aphorism right now.”

“So you are, in fact, dating Ms. Hudson?” He sounds dazed. She wishes she could bring herself to lift her head and see the look on his face.

“No! I mean. Not intentionally, not at the moment, I haven’t _asked_ her to date me, but I enjoy her company very much, and--”

“And for the record,” comes a soft voice from the doorway, “I would say yes, if you did ask.”

Joan looks up, and she and Sherlock stare at Ms. Hudson for a long, humiliating moment.

Ms. Hudson makes a face. “Thin walls. As you both observed.”

Sherlock clears his throat loudly. “Charlotte. Of course I’m sorry if we’ve made you--”

“Charlotte?” Joan asks, startled.

Ms. Hudson blushes. “I was working my way up to a proper introduction, but it seemed odd to throw that out after we’ve already got to know each other so well, like I missed my moment, you know?”

“It’s a lovely name.”

They smile at each other stupidly for a moment until Sherlock clears his throat again with a tissue-tearing “Ah- _hem_.”

Ms. Hudson--Charlotte--looks at him with sympathy. “Oh, darling. Don’t worry. I have no desire whatsoever to end our involvement.”

“Are you certain? Because I will… yield the field, so to speak, to Watson, if that’s what you want.”

“What about what I want?” Joan asks the ceiling. “Is anyone interested in that?”

“You just said what you want,” Sherlock snaps, “so if you could just be quiet for a minute and let us--”

“What, let the grown-ups talk? I don’t think so.”

Ms. Hudson sighs. “This is what I want. Though at the moment I’m not sure I remember why. But both of you. This.”

Joan points at Sherlock. “I’m not kissing him. Ever.”

“That’s fair enough.”

Sherlock is making that face again. “I feel very much like this entire conversation has moved on without me.”

Ms. Hudson laughs, bright and clear. “I think you’ll need to get used to that.”


End file.
